


The Ships Are Left To Rust

by spaceleviathan



Series: Family of Frost [6]
Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Gen, familial bond
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-15
Updated: 2013-03-15
Packaged: 2017-12-05 10:22:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/721971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spaceleviathan/pseuds/spaceleviathan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loki refuses to see his son lowered into the ground and left to rot.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Ships Are Left To Rust

**Author's Note:**

  * For [clockworkclown](https://archiveofourown.org/users/clockworkclown/gifts).



> Pick your favourite sad song as a soundtrack. Let's make this as sad as possible.   
> This is a bit of a break, because whilst I’m (slowly) writing the next chapter of the other one, I also wanted to do this. So.  
> For clockworkclown. Bring it.

He set off the boat alone, small and roughly crafted by his own hands, heavy and dangerous and ugly. But it didn’t matter, since it held nothing of value within.

He watched it float into the centre of the lake, awkwardly cutting its path through the thinning ice which had been heated deliberately by Loki’s hand to allow it passage. It stopped where Loki wished it to, in the dead centre of the water, hovering as Loki imagined it would, lingered where he desired, floated as he envisioned. The sight was beautiful, truly, even heavy with memories and grief as it was, adorned with shaking runes and repulsive carvings. He had been too unsteady for much else; had other things to focus on.

Abigail wasn’t there with him. She was across the town at the graveyard where they were lowering a small coffin into the ground – too slight to be mistaken for a grown man, so very obviously that of a mere child. That was her goodbye. It was her way. She could not stand the thought of letting their son go, so had to be content with keeping him close. When Loki said his ideas of a funeral were different, she could barely stand to look at him.

She had been outraged. She had screamed at him, hit him, cried and broken things, tried to claw him, had tried to make him see he was a monster. _You will not burn my son_. _You will not send him away to burn alone_.

She had followed her church, her beliefs, her God. She had calmed down, she had sobbed herself into silence, but she had pushed his hands away when he wished to comfort her.

He did not understand. He could not comprehend the beauty in allowing his child to rot in the ground instead of sending him off to a better world with pride and honour, but he could not speak up against it. She saw him as enough of a devil as it was.

_You would so willingly send him to hell?_

How Loki wished his son was in Hel. How he wished it had been that easy.

He could not bear the go to the funeral, despite how much he knew he’d be demonised for his absence. However, he would not have been able to stand and watch them pour the dirt over the memory of his boy. The same as he knew Abigail would never sleep easy again if she had watched him burn, Loki could not live each day hyperaware she would readily let him putrefy instead.

The worst thing, perhaps, was that in neither the coffin nor the boat laid his child’s body. Rather, it had disappeared in the time between Loki discovering his death and returning from Hel’s domain. In a way it was a blessing: had the boy been in that coffin, every day would be marked by the Loki could feel the child’s magic spread further into the ground – that undeveloped seiðr, weak and unusable to a human, being suckled up by the earth as the body decayed. Loki would eventually be living upon a land which was more his son than whatever was left of his boy’s body. And that would have torn him apart.

At the same time, he needed the body returned. That it had been taken (and it had to have been) was the epitome of malevolence, the nightmare a father never realised he may have to face, and Loki was going to find whoever was responsible for such an act of evil. Whilst he was ready to swear that he would not rest until his son was recovered, he also knew the length of time it could take him to achieve such a goal. This was emphasised by how he had not found so much as a clue so far, even with all his abilities; not a glimmer on the winds nor a scent in the air that proclaimed to him, _this way_. Therefore, he had to find his temporary peace. Better it be here than sneering upon the hallowed ground before the village, where his wife could see.

He clicked his finger briefly as it rested limp at his side, igniting the boat and catching the tinder piled high within. Immediately the flames were licking at the wooden construct, silhouetting the vessel, and, unsightly as it was, it seemed beautiful.

He could no longer see in the shadows, but upon the wood was the face of his son, of his family, of protection spells and well wishings and prayers to on high that he be safe. _Please, mother, Hel, anyone – let my son be safe._

After that, there was nothing left for him to do but watch as all he had left of his youngest son burned.

\--

Jack saw the light from afar, curious at the strange glimmer of it, and startled by the sight in the middle of a heavily wooded area. He followed the trail of smoke to the light source, upon which he realised it was the lake – _his_ lake, the one he had emerged from – which was aflame. Something was ablaze in the centre of it.

He saw the man from a few days before, this time alone and wrapped up tightly in dark furs, watching by the edge of the water with his most terrible expression about him. The same one as when they had first met. The same one which had frightened Jack away.

“What are you burning?” He asked, used to talking to himself already, before looking more closely at the flaming object. “A boat? Why are you burning a boat?” It wasn’t a little one, but it still seemed somewhat counterproductive.

But the man didn’t reply. Instead, as Jack watched, his face crumpled, his hands clenched at his sides and his head hung forward. His shoulders started to shake as sobs wracked his body, and Jack was thrown with what to do. He’d seen the women cry, but not _him_. This man hadn’t seemed the sort to let loose his emotions with tears. He’d appeared the solid force of the family, the ground stone which kept them all together. Perhaps this was why he sobbed towards the snow now, alone and in the flickering lights of the fire, rather than closer to the village where his loved ones were no doubt waiting for him.

Jack perched himself on a tree on the opposite side of the lake, watching equally the male with his tears and the burning boat. He wished he knew the significance of it, or why the sight reduced a strong man to weeping.

Suddenly the man looked up towards the centre of the lake, eyes glinting in the orange glow, dangerous and angry and wet, cheeks lined with evidence of his distress. Jack jumped, clinging to the tree trunk for support in the surprise of such a burdened face, dark with his anger, brimming with rage. And then the spirit almost fell from the tree completely when the fire sparked, shooting high up into the air and raining down upon the water. From there, horrifically, it spread as if it had landed upon a dry forest floor.

It consumed the lake, red hot and bright, flames rising up to the skies ominously, obscuring Jack’s vision with the smoke it produced. Jack, a creature born of ice and cold, immediately wished to run away, go in the opposite direction and steer clear of the sudden inferno, but he also wasn’t about to let someone come to harm if he could help it.

“Be careful!” He tried to plead despite knowing he wouldn’t be heard, jumping through the trees to get a clear view of the man once more, wishing for nothing more than to push him away from the water he had been so close to.  However Jack quickly came to realise that the fire was not encroaching over the river banks – it stopped long before it could touch the man watching. He saw the male in question, in his black clothes, with his shadowed expression, only smile vindictively upon the sight. He was enjoying it. He was proud.

And then Jack realised – _he_ had been the one to set fire to the lake. Somehow. Despite the fact he was reasonably sure that wasn’t how water worked, it was a sobering thought. What had his lake done to deserve such a fate? It was just a lake.

People were yelling as they drew closer, footsteps pounding through the snow, screaming at each other and through the trees towards the man. From his vantage point, far up a tree and facing the dark-haired male, Jack watched as the persona started to slip away. The fury fell with his face as he collapsed shivering into the snow, realising, perhaps, for the first time what he had done. The villagers started coming through to the clearing, shocked and terrified at the sight, and Jack decided the man was safe in their hands. Now was the time for him to go before the heat grew too much to bear.

“My son,” Jack heard the man whisper as he fled in the opposite direction. “Gods, my son.”


End file.
